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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 7455149" data-attributes="member: 6696971">Sorry for the delay in getting back.  Alright, so my thoughts:I definitely agree with TwoSix's first thought above:   a)  "I imagine there's a decent correlation between those who disliked 4e and those who disliked TLJ for the same reasons; it didn't match their expectations of what "D&D" or "Star Wars" should be."  I also saw on the TLJ thread on these boards that there are "people who like TLJ and dislike 4e."  I didn't see a breakdown for the reasons for that in that thread (though I invoked it to try to get the reasoning for it).  TwoSix provides this:b)  "...their explanation is that primarily because Star Wars is a narrative and should evolve, whereas D&D is a process and should stay more fixed."Ovinomancer provides the following two thoughts:c)  "I like the shakeup of TLJ, I think 4e solved 3e's problems, and I think 4e almost lost D&D's base by not respecting the traditionalists."d)  "Star Wars is a narrative, D&D is a game used to create narratives.  The change in Star Wars TLJ was to juggle a few of the tropes while largely adhering to the SW genre.  4e radically changed the underlying assumptions of how the game works.  I do not think these are comparable."1)  Let me start with one part of (d):I definitely don't agree with the premise that TLJ just juggled a few of the tropes but largely adhered to the SW genre.  In fact, I think I'd probably go so far as to say that I've never seen a movie so profoundly push back against or overturn its trope/theme/lore/continuity lineage than TLJ did.  I'm a big Star Wars fan, but not by any stretch of the imagination a "fanboy" or anywhere near the biggest I know.  I know a ton of SW fans.  Waaaaaaaaaay more than D&D fans.  These people range from "just sort of a SW fan" like me to the ridiculously obsessed lore honks (like we see with FR or PS in D&D).  To nearly a person (3 out of perhaps the 100 or so that I know well), these people didn't just consider that movie a bad SW movie, they considered it a "betrayal."  Seriously...using overwrought language like that.  I don't get that deeply into fandom, but I understand where they're coming from.  And after exploring that phenomenon on the internet, that same sense of "betrayal" is expressed pervasively.I think the evidence for the SW fans' sense of "betrayal" at TLJ is pretty well captured with Solo's complete flop compared to Rogue One's box office numbers.  A movie about Han (frickin') Solo should absolutely obliterate the box office.  He is one of the most iconic characters in the history of Western cinema.  Rogue One?  A story about an unknown group getting the plans to the Death Star?  The former (Solo) is sitting at 368 M world-wide after 5.4 weeks of release (and everything showing pretty much a stall-out at this point).  The latter (R1)?  Well over 1 B world-wide.The only difference is the latter was released after TLJ and the former released before it.  Those two lines of evidence (the wilting backlash by hardcore fans) and the box office disparity between those two movies (despite Solo carrying the force-multiplying "Han factor") are pretty overwhelming I think.But that being said, while I definitely think you could do a hardcore, objective analysis of trope/theme/lore/continuity for trope/theme/lore/continuity to compare TLJ vs 4e, there is invariably going to be a not-insignificant subjective component to that.  So that is probably not particularly worthwhile to do (and that would just bog down this thread and feel a little douchey on my part for leading the conversation so astray...apologies to all for that, by the way!).2)  What I think can be an interesting conversation is where (b) and (d) have some expressed similarity; movie narratives and underlying assumptions can/should evolve more in movies while narratives and underlying assumptions in RPGs need to remain heavily curated toward stability/orthodoxy over time.Its interesting because I find that proposition to be completely inverted.  The reason for that is simple:A movie born on the back of a lineage is a creation of screenplay/cast/directors/producers/and help.  Fans have absolutely 0 (direct) impact on its content or its telling.  They aren't active participants.  They are passive consumers.  Once the tale is told...its told.  It is cemented as a piece of cinematic continuity/canon forevermore.  There is no veto process and/or "redoes" (and even if there were, the same passive consumer position for fans would exist for those).  The only "veto power" the fans can express is lack of engagement with subsequent content (see Solo).RPGs are precisely the opposite.  GM and players are active participants.  As such:(a) The game itself can be hacked if the table wishes.  Premise, resolution mechanics, play procedures, reward cycles, social contract over authority and content introduction, etc can all be massaged and manipulated at the discretion of those active participants.(b)  Any setting/trope/genre components can be drifted, annulled, evolved, or ret-conned at the discretion of those active participants.(c)  Because of all of the above, the shared imaginary space and the work of fiction at an individual RPG table is entirely self-derived.[HR][/HR]Thoughts?</blockquote>

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